Is it bad to update product titles and URLs if they are only slightly modified

[isle_surf]

I am doing some house cleaning on the site and made some minor updates to product titles and a rule was written in and it auto updated the URL to what the product title was with a redirect put in place from the old URL. If this a bad thing and should i leave the URL alone and just update the product title?

Then for the ones i did change the Product title and the URL was updated is this a bad thing and should i have just left the URL alone? These are all high ranking popular products so dont want to mess with any rankings going into busy season?

[Caro-O]

Was the original URL still relevant to the product even though you changed the product title?

Assuming it was, it's best to leave the URLs alone. Changing a URL (even with a 301 in place) just for housekeeping purposes is not great for SEO. I don't usually change URLs without a very good reason. If the original URL has attracted inbound links, that link benefit will be slightly compromised. You also run the risk of losing track of your 301s or incurring looping 301s if you're letting them auto-update without a solid plan.

If you decide to go with the redirects, keep a spreadsheet of all redirecting pages for your own tracking purposes.

~Caro

[BasKierkels]

Hi Marc,

Changing a URL is like moving your house or office: it can definately be done but you need to think it through. If you just move and don't tell anyone it will be a matter of time before some trouble might start.

Do you have anything in place that will tell Google that you have changed the URL/URL's? Otherwise it will consider the new URL as a completely new page, with a lot less trust than the old URL probably had. The value of the old URL will be lost. Essentially, Google will think you now have two URL's: the old and the new. It won't all of a sudden realise those are the same.

If you have anything in place to tell Google that you have changed the name of the page, the process will go smoother and much better. As soon as Google will visit the old URL, it will be informed of two things:
1. The old URL has been replaced, does not exist anymore and needs to be replaced in the index
2. It knows the new URL right away and will start to replace the old with the new URL and transfer the value of the old URL to the new URL

Every time a page is being loaded, the server will send - amongst others - the source code. And a header code: 200 is everything is OK, 404 is the page cannot be found, 500 is something is wrong with the server, 301 is the URL has changed to something new, etc.

If you don't do anything, Google will read a 404-code and thus think there is an error in your site.

It's better to send a 301-code because that will tell Google that nothing is wrong; you've just changed the URL. It will also tell what the new URL is.

Check out this page for more information about 301 and 302 redirects:
https://moz.com/learn/seo/redirection

Does this help you?

Yours,
Bas

[BasKierkels]

Hi Marc,

Could you please tell us if Caro of i have answered your question? If so, please mark the answer. It's nice to get some credits for the work we've both put into this

Thanks very much.
Bas